Has He, can He have created these unquenchable longings only to tantalize them?

On the 27th, at daylight, a vessel was seen in the offing, as if to tantalize us.

But is not this to tantalize us by ordering us to do what we cannot do?

They were allowed enough to tantalize but not to satisfy them.

You forbid me to tantalize you with an invitation to Weston, and yet you invite me to Eartham!

And yet, when the tarts were divided among ten girls you just got enough to tantalize you.

WORD ORIGIN

1590s, from Latin Tantalus, from Greek Tantalos, king of Phrygia, son of Zeus, punished in the afterlife (for an offense variously given) by being made to stand in a river up to his chin, under branches laden with fruit, all of which withdrew from his reach whenever he tried to eat or drink. His story was known to Chaucer (c.1369).